The Naval Route to the Abyss

The Anglo-German Naval Race 1895-1914

Matthew S. Seligmann, Frank Nägler

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317023258
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Australian & Oceanian History
• Index: History

The intense rivalry in battleship building that took place between Britain and Germany in the run up to the First World War is seen by many as the most totemic of all armaments races. Blamed by numerous commentators during the inter-war years as a major cause of the Great War, it has become emblematic of all that is wrong with international competitions in military strength. Yet, despite this notoriety, 'the Great Naval Race' has not received the attention that this elevated status would merit and it has never been examined from the viewpoint of both of its participants simultaneously and equally. This volume, which contains a comprehensive survey of the existing scholarship on this topic, both English-language and German, as well as important primary source materials from a range of archives in both Britain and Germany, fills this gap. By putting the actions of the British Admiralty side-by-side with those of its German counterparts, it enables the naval race to be viewed comparatively and thereby facilitates an understanding of how the two parties to this conflict interacted. By offering a comprehensive range of German documents in both their original text and in English translation, the book makes the German role in this conflict accessible to an English speaking audience for the first time. As such, it is an essential volume for any serious student of naval policy in the pre-First World War era.

1

TIRPITZ’S ASCENDENCY: THE DESIGN AND INITIAL EXECUTION OF A NAVAL CHALLENGE 1895–1904/5

Tirpitz¹ was officially appointed State Secretary in charge of the Imperial Navy Office on 15 June 1897. A new era was about to begin, one sufficiently distinct from earlier periods for later historians to refer to the ‘Ära Tirpitz’.² If not for the impact of his policies, the sheer duration of his term in office (1897–1916) provided ample justification for this labelling. However, the State Secretary’s naval policy did not achieve what it was meant to. Tirpitz himself later despondently acknowledged that the work of his lifetime would come to a close under a negative prefix.³ This was not least due to the measures his British opponent had rather unexpectedly taken from around 1904/5 onwards, which were to falsify Tirpitz’s basic assumptions. Though the roots of the State Secretary’s ultimate failure can accordingly be traced back to pillars central to his very own plan, these fallacies did not emerge until the last years of his first decade in office.

Most of the documents in this chapter are selected so as to present a more or less detailed view of Tirpitz’s programme as it unfolded almost unimpeded during the first seven to eight years of his term in office. This plan basically centred on an armaments programme designed to secure Germany’s rise to world power status in the face of anticipated British interference. At the same time, it aimed at emancipating the fiscal foundation of the Imperial Navy from budgetary control of the Reichstag. Seen in a broader context, both objectives were aimed at the ulterior objective of shielding Prusso-German constitutionalism, which favoured the rule of pre-industrial elites, from the political effects of the industrialisation by relying on this very same industrialisation in Germany’s quest for world power status.⁴ As a rather complex armaments programme the Tirpitz Plan had to take into account and integrate political, economic, fiscal, strategic, tactical, and technical matters and consider their interdependency. International politics and strategic or operational naval concepts to be applied against the designated opponent suggested the creation of a specific naval capability which could only be created by observing given tactical and technical needs and potentials. Likewise the required naval capability had to be provided for under the twofold constraints of the industrial capacity available, and the willingness of parliament to appropriate the funds requested. This, in turn, called for parliamentary tactics and affected domestic politics – the more so since there was a desire to establish the navy on a stable financial base removed from parliamentary interference.

These rather general observations did not apply exclusively to the Tirpitz Plan. As its elements taken individually were not necessarily unique to Tirpitz’s programme, the substance of the new departure ascribed to it may best be illustrated by a comparison of the first three documents presented here. Having been drafted during the years immediately preceding Tirpitz’s rise to State Secretary, they point to continuity as well as to changes associated with Tirpitz’s ascendency. At the same time, the two papers originating from the pen of the soon-to-be State Secretary provide some insights into the basic framework of his design and its persistence as the Tirpitz Plan evolved over the two decades to follow.

Not long after having succeeded to the throne, on 20 March 1889 Wilhelm II had dissolved the Imperial Admiralty and formed two supreme agencies in charge of the Imperial Navy. The Imperial Navy Office (Reichsmarineamt) acquired the administrative tasks under a State Secretary answering to the Emperor and the Chancellor. The High Command of the Navy (Oberkommando der Marine) with a Commanding Admiral as its Head dealt with the operational matters and exercised the imperial command authority answering to the Emperor only. Together with the Navy Cabinet (Marinekabinett) which served as the Emperor’s bureau for the affairs concerning the Imperial Navy, these two supreme agencies were supposed to cooperate. Instead, rivalries quickly came up.¹ When Tirpitz served as chief of staff the High Command strove to refine its tactical and strategic doctrines. The most famous result of these efforts on which Tirpitz had put his stamp was the aforementioned Dienstschrift IX (1894). This document had not only given an exposition of the naval strategic and operational doctrine to be adopted. It had also determined the materiel requirements for the battle fleet envisaged as centring on two squadrons of eight battleships each.

However, to the rising annoyance of the High Command, the Imperial Navy Office stuck to its inclination towards the teachings of the jeune école. With the backing of Wilhelm II, Vice Admiral Friedrich von Hollmann¹ had sought to procure numerous cruisers in lieu of the battleships for which the High Command had persistently and comprehensively argued. The naval estimates from 1891/92 until 1895/96 had provided for four coast defence battleships (of rather limited combat effectiveness) and eight cruisers of various rates, but only for one battleship, the Ersatz Preußen, later to become Kaiser Friedrich III.² On 27 October 1895, the Imperial Navy Office sent a draft of the budget proposals for 1896/97 to the High Command on short notice. The next day Admiral Eduard von Knorr³ stated in his reply that the construction programme to be submitted by the Imperial Navy Office had originally completely ignored the well-founded proposals of the High Command. Indeed, the Imperial Navy Office had planned to procure only one battleship, two second-class protected cruisers (disparagingly dubbed ‘ten-minutes-cruisers’ by the British, insinuating the time required to sink them), and a fourth-class unprotected cruiser.⁴ Knorr took up the gauntlet and pleaded the case of the High Command directly with the Emperor [1]. Upon receipt of his report the former chief of staff, Rear Admiral Tirpitz, was approached by the Chief of the Navy Cabinet, Rear Admiral Gustav Freiherr von Senden-Bibran,⁵ and asked to comment on Knorr’s memorandum. Tirpitz drafted his own paper during the closing days of 1895 and on 3 January 1896 he delivered a written report to the Emperor [2].⁶ Six weeks later and after the ‘Krüger-Telegramm’, sent by Wilhelm II on 3 January, had caused the Transvaal Crisis to sour the relations between Britain and Germany,⁷ Tirpitz on 13 February 1896 came back to some of his proposals put forward in his commentary, elaborated on them, and at times broadened their scope in his letter to General Albrecht von Stosch [3], who had served as the first Head of the Imperial Admiralty and with whom Tirpitz had entered into a trustful correspondence.¹ Seen in their interrelation, these three documents already reveal a good deal of the peculiarities of the proposals Tirpitz was to inaugurate two years later.

Basically the High Command’s paper dealt with an armaments programme, with the requirements to be met in order to carry it into effect, with a concept of naval warfare coupled with an assessment of the international situation on both of which the armaments effort was to be based.² As for the substance of the programme, the High Command called for the rebuilding of the battle fleet up to the strength of a two-squadron battle force by 1908, supported by the required light forces, which in part were destined for service on foreign stations. In order to attain the planned total, it was deemed necessary to add to the fleet, over the next twelve years, at least twelve battleships, three armoured and twelve protected cruisers. Besides providing for a back-up in overseas contingencies, the main function of the fleet was to defend the seas adjacent to Germany, including the coastal regions and harbours. The aim was to secure sea control in home waters. Such an endeavour would require a long-term construction programme with the costs spread evenly over the period till 1908. The necessary economies were to be achieved by a stringent reduction to only three types of fleet units – battleship, armoured cruiser, protected cruiser – which being of rather moderate size were to be capable of serving with the battle fleet as well as on overseas stations. Subsequent to 1908, the plan apparently aimed at a steady replacement programme.

Not surprisingly, Tirpitz in his commentary wholeheartedly endorsed the recommendations put forward by the High Command which closely followed the prescriptions of the Dienstschrift IX concerning the battle fleet’s composition and crucial role. Notwithstanding some minor amendments Tirpitz adopted the construction programme of the High Command. He also concurred with it in considering it necessary to arrange for a new relationship with the Reichstag seeking its commitment to a long-term construction programme. However, in two aspects he went beyond the scope set by the High Command.

While dealing with the necessity to mobilise public support in order to persuade the Reichstag to consent to a long-term armaments effort, Tirpitz introduced an argument which can be interpreted in terms of a concept of a ‘secondary integration’, designed to preserve the specifics of the Prusso-German pre-industrial rule in the face of a rapidly industrialising Germany.¹ Closely related to this extension was another broadening of scope by which Tirpitz shifted the focus of Germany’s naval policy. Whereas the High Command had written of the need to preserve the world power status of Germany, the only contingency it dealt with was a war against the Dual Alliance – i.e. against Russia and France, possibly joined by Denmark. Tirpitz instead suggested for the fleet a role guarding against British interferences as well. When, in the wake of the Transvaal Crisis, Stosch asked him for an evaluation of the German prospects in an Anglo-German war he accordingly elaborated on the notion he had already expressed in his commentary on the High Command’s memorandum.²

Again, Tirpitz, taking a longer-term view, stuck to the prospect of a battle fleet numbering two or three squadrons as recommended by the High Command, albeit signalling a tendency for an extension. Taking up the assessment voiced in his commentary, Tirpitz considered this fleet to provide for sufficient strength to eventually force the decision-makers in London to pay due regard to the German interests. In this context he repeated his promotion of the ‘political importance of sea power’. This may be viewed as a sign of the distortion of a sound naval strategy by the ideology of sea power, since Tirpitz had apparently disregarded the paramount importance Dienstschrift IX had placed on the capability to seize the strategic offensive. On the other hand, Tirpitz stuck to the strategic significance the High Command had attributed to the coastal regions and to their crucial vulnerabilities. His vision of an Anglo-German war located the decisive operations (including the bombardment of London) in the vicinity of the belligerents’ shores while at the same time disparaging the contribution of any commerce raidin...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Notes on German Sources
• Introduction
• 1 Tirpitz’s Ascendency: The Design and Initial Execution of a Naval Challenge 1895–1904/5
• 2 Recognising the German Challenge: The Royal Navy 1898–1904
• 3 Obstacles, Success, and Risks: The German Navy, 1905–1907
• 4 Meeting the German Challenge: The Royal Navy 1905–1907
• 5 Tirpitz Triumphant? German Naval Policy 1908–1911
• 6 Surpassing the German Challenge: The Royal Navy 1908–1911
• 7 Decay: German Naval Policy 1912–1914
• 8 Defeating the German Challenge: The Royal Navy 1912–1914
• Sources and Documents
• Index